“It’s okay,” I told him. He had a scrape from one of the branches on his cheek. It was bleeding. I grabbed a tissue and held it up to his cheek. He took it, as if he was embarrassed to have me help him. “Is everything okay?”

“No,” he said. “It’s all wrong. And for the past few weeks I’ve been trying to figure out why. I kept avoiding the obvious answer, but I can’t anymore. It’s clearly the only thing that will make things right.”

“What?”

“I miss you,” he said.

My mouth hung open.

“Listen. I don’t care what you did. I get it. If you really loved being with Kane, you would have been with him. But you weren’t, and there’s a reason for that. It’s because you belong with me. All I care about is what happens from this day on. And if you feel the same way, and if we both promise not to make the same mistakes, there’s no reason it can’t work, right?”

“But, Luisa—”

“That’s what I’m telling you. I’m breaking up with her. All I was doing, and all I would ever do for the rest of my life, is compare girls to you. You’re my girl, Hailey. You fit with me.”

He took my hand. His were like ice, as if he’d walked home from Luisa’s while thinking about that. I couldn’t speak. It was everything I’d wished he would give to me, and maybe that’s why it scared me so much.

“Let’s do something. Can you come with me?” he asked.

“It’s the middle of the night,” I said. But I would’ve gone anywhere with him.

We managed to creep downstairs, into the backyard to the broken-down pirate’s ship. We climbed up into the clubhouse, even though it was clumped with old snow. He said, “Remember that night?”

Of course I did. The night we kissed for the first time.

I wanted to go back. I wanted to start again. “If I could, I would have told you everything, Declan,” I said to him. “I promise.”

“I know,” he said, wrapping an arm around me to ward off the cold. “I know.”

Monday, July 8

Morning

Finished!

The text comes in at seven in the morning. I rip the pillow off my head and groan as the bright summer light assaults my eyes. Then I look at my phone and smile.

I type in: Scumbag. I’m still on page 280.

Home stretch. Text me after you read the thrilling conclusion.

I check my phone again to make sure I hadn’t read the time wrong. No, it seriously is only seven in the morning on a summer Monday. Being up this early is probably against the law in some cultures. It’s too early. My mind doesn’t process anything until 9 at the earliest.